In Between Days
by coloursflyaway
Summary: When Thor comes to visit him the first time, the other is shimmering golden and crimson, still bloody after the fight; scratches and bruises forming the most beautiful patterns on tanned skin. Loki looks away and waits for him to leave.


(1)

When Thor comes to visit him the first time, the other is shimmering golden and crimson, still bloody after the fight; scratches and bruises forming the most beautiful patterns on tanned skin.  
Loki looks away and waits for him to leave.

(2)

Thor comes again, because he's still as insolent and stubborn as Loki can remember him to be, but this time, he's not beautiful, nor is he familiar; he's proud and radiating power and Loki knows why mortals, why Aesir would be afraid of him.  
"Odinson", he half sneers, half greets and uses the name Thor used to treasure so much (does he still? Loki does not know) as an insult. For a moment, he considers looking away but doesn't, although it's hard to see Thor like this when he is locked away, powerless, helpless.

"What is it you want from me?", Loki finally asks, because Thor won't and continues to hold the gaze of the man he used to call brother. It seems like a century, a millennium ago, and yet the word is still a fresh scar in Loki's scarred mind.  
There are a thousand different answers Loki expects to hear (revenge, blood, forgiveness, love, nothing at all), but Thor doesn't give any of them, instead looks at him with eyes that are hardened and cold, but soften when Loki keeps holding his gaze.  
"Nothing you could give", Thor finally says, and the hint of sadness in his voice, which still sounds like thunder, like rumbling stones, goes undetected until after the other has left the room again.

Loki stares after him without wanting to for a moment, then shakes his head with a force that makes his neck hurt and his joints creak, dismissing all thoughts of Thor for another, precious while.

(3)

Somehow Loki expects the thunderer to visit again the next day (or whatever he thinks to be the next day), but Thor doesn't, apparently isn't as desperate as Loki has thought him to be, and he isn't sure if he likes it that way or not. It's good not to see Thor, since it is always good not to see Thor, but he is weary of his cell already, has mapped it out both with his feet and his mind; a distraction, any distraction sounds pleasant, and if it's only trying not to imagine Thor drenched in blood, either his or the others.  
But Thor doesn't show, neither this day nor the one after, and so Loki paces from one side of the room to the other again and again, imagines that his footsteps will carve themselves into the floor.

(4)

Thor doesn't comes visit him the day afterwards either and Loki almost feels disappointed.

(5)

In the end, it takes so long for Thor to visit that every of Loki's bones hurts from walking and lying on his bed and sitting around for what feels like forever, that his thoughts are buzzing and thumping against the inside of his skull.  
The other is carved out of marble and gold, besieged in warm light and Loki has to look away so he won't be blinded.  
If he could, he would ask Thor what he wants, what brings him here now, which hasn't done so before, but he doesn't speak, because it would feel like letting Thor win to speak first, and he can't even bear the thought. Maybe Thor thinks of it the same way, since it seems like a century has passed by the time the other finally parts his lips.  
Loki smiles to himself, because the other is weak when he isn't.

"How have they treated you?", Thor asks and it takes a moment until Loki realises what feels wrong about the question. A word is missing, the word _brother_, which used to always be there, waiting for Loki as an insult as much as a term of endearment.  
Another piece of _home_ and _past_ and _family_ and _love_ breaks and crumbles and Loki takes whatever is left of it and brushes it aside, stores it away in the one corner of his mind he never visits.

The question is useless, undeserving of an answer, and so Loki doesn't give one, even if his once silver tongue is aching to weave words to sentences to speeches. To keep his tongue from acting on its own volition, he sneers, then lets it speak after all; not an answer, but another question.  
"What brings the golden prince of Asgard to my lowly quarters?", he asks, keeps his voice as smooth and poisonous as possible. Still, speaking is better than sitting there, imagining how it would be to burst through the damned glass wall between them and strangle Thor with his own cape, tugging on it until the skin of his palms would break, blood seeping into the crimson fabric undetectably.

"What do you gain from this?", Thor replies after another silence and with another question, which Loki still does not intend to answer. And his silver tongue must be copper after all, for it has gotten rusty; the only thing which comes to his mind is to ask, "What is it you gain?"  
Thor looks broken, and Loki relishes every second of it, until the other turns around without another word and leaves. He still hasn't replied to the question, and Loki wonders if it's because Thor doesn't know how to, or if he expects him to know the answer already.

(6)

And then, an eternity he spent alone afterwards, there comes the point where Loki has memorised every word in every book; has counted all the tiles on the ceiling and knows which ones are broken, which splintered; has tried out every spell he has ever known only to feel the magic inside him swell and spark and die down again. It's a horrifying realisation, because without anything to keep his mind busy, the memories come.  
It's always been hard to keep them away, because ever since falling, Loki's thoughts are a jumbled mess, everywhere at once, which makes concentrating hard, and keeping things locked up harder, but now it is impossible.  
There are so many of them, old ones and new ones, memories of Frigga and Odin, of the Chitauri, of Thor; there are some he likes and some he wishes he could forget, some he loves with a burning passion and some he despises to the point where they make him want to claw his own face of just to keep them from assaulting him.  
It's hard to decide which he hates most, the ones of defeat and pain or disappointment, or the ones where he is happy and content, buried in books or underneath his then-brother's body, forgetting about the world.

New ones every day, more vivid and detailed, more painful and Loki catches himself wishing Thor would visit, if just to keep him from remembering the brightness of his eyes and the warmth of his smile, the grace of his movements and the thunder always clinging to his voice.

(7)

Hours pass and turn to days and weeks and months, and Thor does not visit again and something happens which Loki would never have thought possible: He forgets.  
He forgets about everything, because his mind is too busy with sorting through memory after memory, day after day of his impossibly long life; the seidr he cannot release keeping him awake, because his cage blocks it, lets it die on his fingertips when Loki tries to let it rush from them. It's thrumming under his skin, in his blood and breath, his very being and it's loud and insistent and torturous and so strong that he doesn't even notice when the door opens.

He doesn't notice for a long time, because Thor does not say a thing, just watches and watches and watches, waits until Loki feels how the air has changed (because it does whenever the god of thunder is present; becomes electric and loaded with what Loki thinks thunder must taste like).  
When he finally does, because the fine hairs on his arms are raised, a shiver travelling down his back, his first impulse is to whip around, greedy for anything which is not his cell, which maybe will manage to dull the crackling of magic inside him, but he doesn't, instead stays in the position he is in, half facing the wall and only making out a blurred form of red and gold in the corner of his eye.  
Loki takes a deep breath, because no matter how he is feeling, he cannot let Thor see any of it, then, with his mask fixed in place, turns around.

Thor looks like he always does, strong and unmoving, but Loki thinks, imagines, hopes that there is a lingering sadness in the other's eyes.

Loki never gives the order, but his body gets up nonetheless, graceless and clumsy unlike he used to be, every joint and muscle fighting to keep him upright after such a long time. It takes an eternity and Loki keeps his eyes fixed on Thor's, searching for pity, searching for compassion and finding none.  
Years have passed since he has felt so satisfied.

Stumbling, treacherous feet carry him over to the glass wall which he can't ever leave behind, and no matter if he notices or not, Thor steps closer too, just a fraction, just enough for Loki to notice. There is something achingly familiar in the other's gaze, and for a moment, it's not just Thor in front of him, but every version of the thunderer Loki has ever known; the brother he shared stories and a bed with; the friend at whose jokes he laughed; the lover, whose heart he took and gave his own in return; the prince, he bowed to and yet planned to sabotage; the enemy, he attacked with both weapons and words; the captor, he owes his life to and yet despises.  
It's too much, and Loki feels himself growing dizzy; it's too much and he hates the other for it, hates himself more because he still can't hate Thor enough.

There are no words, not in Loki's, and apparently also not in Thor's mind, so all they can do is look, the thunderer's gaze almost like a physical touch, burning into Loki's flesh until even the seidr still bubbling and boiling inside of him is forgotten because he is burning all over.

Somehow it feels as if he should raise his hand, press it against the glass to at least try and reforge the connection which they have lost, but at the same time, Loki feels like destroying everything which has ever bound him to this realm in the first place, so he stays put, trying not to move even a muscle.  
His body is not to be trusted around Thor after all.

"How have you fared?", Thor finally asks and his voice does not sound like thunder, but like soft spring rain, like wind blowing through long grass and like branches creaking under the weight of the snow.  
Loki catches himself wanting to tear Thor apart, limb by limb, joint by joint.  
Again, it's a question which does not deserve an answer, so he stays silent, turns away and tries to ignore that he can still see Thor's face when he closes his eyes.

A silence follows which seems to be as important as anything either of them could possibly say, and then Thor whispers under his breath, so quietly that Loki only just hears it over the beat of his own heart, "Is my love really so hard to bear?"  
And Loki wants to answer yes, wants to answer no, and in the end, because both things are true, answers nothing at all.  
Something breaks between them, he can feel it, and when Thor leaves without another word, he can feel the other taking a part of him, too.

(8)

Time passes and Loki doesn't expect Thor to come and visit him anymore, hasn't ever since the other walked out the last time. What it was he destroyed, Loki is still not sure after months have passed, but it feels like something he should celebrate and still cannot bring himself to.  
The seidr is still eating away at him, making him burn and ache and crave something he can't put into words, but by now, Loki has almost stopped hoping that he will feel it flow from his fingers again, feel it spark and dance and tingle on his skin. It's been too long, and with every day, Loki forgets how the world outside looked and smelt and sounded.

His hair is growing out in wild tangles and strands, his skin becomes almost translucent and Loki has stopped caring; apart from the occasional guard to bring him clothes or food or a book, no one sees him. Sometimes, he wonders if he is still being remembered, by Frigga or Odin or Thor; if parents tell their children about the fallen prince at night.  
It would be a good story, full of love and betrayal and defeat, and Loki hates the thought all the more for it.

And then, there are footsteps approaching, heavy and full of purpose, and it's the first time in forever that Loki does not recognise them, thinks them to belong to a guard and not the man who is suddenly standing in front of his cage, changing the air with every breath.

It's Thor's reflection he sees first, and it startles him, because there is no red, just gold, and Thor's hair has grown longer too, falls way past his once-brother's shoulders in waves and small braids which look so much like the ones Loki used to put into the other's hair when they were younger and Thor fell asleep before him. And another things has changed, for the thunderer's gaze has hardened, doesn't betray any emotion, while the Thor Loki knows has always worn his heart on his sleeve.

Unlike the last visit, he doesn't waste time now, but turns around instantly, mainly because it's hard to believe that Thor is here, in this cold and hateful place, even when the other is standing right in front of him. There are a thousand words on the tip of Loki's tongue, waiting to be spoken, and yet he cannot say a thing.  
Thor can, because Thor, ah, Thor does not care anymore, and Loki loves it as much as he hates it, just like he hates and loves it when the golden prince of Asgard opens his full lips and asks him for help.

Grim satisfaction rises and settles sweetly in his chest, for although Thor might succeed to erase whatever feelings he still had for Loki, he will not ever be free of him; the warmth the realisation brings making his lips curl up in a smirk.  
"You must be truly desperate to come to me for help", he not quite answers, sees Thor's jaw tighten, and it's as addictive as it always was, riling the other up and watching him spiral out of control.

"You should know that when you betray, I will kill you."  
It's not an answer either, but Loki has not expected one, and with Thor's eyes merciless and his tone just as cold, he wants to say yes, wants to say please, and doesn't do either. It would be the last of his victories, making Thor lose the last bit of his control, his morals, and he would take it, Loki thinks, he would, if only because like this, he would always haunt Thor, until the day Ragnarök would come to consume them all.  
But since there is no question, he cannot answer, instead leans forward the slightest bit, and for a moment, it's not the god of thunder in front of him, but his brother, his lover, his friend.  
"When do we start?"


End file.
